** Warning: May Contain Some Plot Spoilers **

Like many readers, I saw the Polanski/Depp film The Ninth Gate before I read Arturo Pérez-Reverte’sThe Club Dumas, and despite what I felt was a let-down ending in the film (we’re taken all the way to the final gate, and then...), I enjoyed it enough to pick up the book years later, hoping for a fleshed out story and an improved finale.

But for those wanting to dance with the devil after an eerie, mysterious, occult-infused plot, the movie may have come closer to a satisfactory ending than I first realized.